Chapter 5 of The Phantom of the Opera - The Enchanted Violin - is one of my favourite chapters in Leroux.
It’s where we hear about Daddy Daae telling Christine and Raoul ‘legends of the lands of the North’ and the line ‘"Little Lotte thought of everything and nothing. Her hair was golden as the sun's rays and her soul as clear and blue as her eyes. She wheedled her mother, was kind to her doll, took great care of her frock and her little red shoes and her fiddle, but most of all loved, when she went to sleep, to hear the Angel of Music."
It’s also where we meet Raoul running into the sea after Christine’s red scarf:
‘One day, a little boy, who was out with his governess, made her take a longer walk than he intended, for he could not tear himself from the little girl whose pure, sweet voice seemed to bind him to her. They came to the shore of an inlet which is still called Trestraou, but which now, I believe, harbours a casino or something of the sort. At that time, there was nothing but sky and sea and a stretch of golden beach. Only, there was also a high wind, which blew Christine's scarf out to sea. Christine gave a cry and put out her arms, but the scarf was already far on the waves. Then she heard a voice say:
"It's all right, I'll go and fetch your scarf out of the sea."’
(text from the de Mattos translation which is freely available online)
Trestraou is very near to Perros-Guirec, which now a busy seaside holiday town. And it really is a ‘stretch of golden beach’ in a natural harbour.
i took these photos on the beach at Trestraou in the summer of 2023. It was very windy on the beach which meant that the light changed quickly!